


the mirror up to nature

by thereigatesquire



Category: Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are Dead - Stoppard
Genre: M/M, No Warnings, a very short screenplay, and their humor transported with them, and won't waste much of your time, it's funny and short, just humor and warm feelings, just our favourite dumb courtiers transported to a film setting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-06
Updated: 2020-05-06
Packaged: 2021-03-02 21:41:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24043786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thereigatesquire/pseuds/thereigatesquire
Summary: ROS: Where are we?GUIL: I believe on a film set.ROS: Ahh.
Relationships: Guildenstern/Rosencrantz
Comments: 3
Kudos: 60





	the mirror up to nature

**Author's Note:**

> i'm gonna admit: i have not seen the r&gad film, so i didn't base this off of it. really, i wasn't planning on writing a short film with r&g at all, but the concept i had just seemed to fit them well; i love these two idiots sm

_ Open with _ ROS and GUIL  _ sitting in a black plane (that is, a field of view, not an aeroplane). The view slowly zooms out to reveal a photo setup, then camera equipment, then a studio, then a warehouse, then a small production town, then reveals that the whole town is a facade. This all takes place over the course of the following conversation: _

ROS: Where are we?

GUIL: I believe on a film set.

ROS: Ahh.

_ (pause as they sit, doing nothing) _

ROS,  _ looking directly at the camera _ : Do people who watch films know that the actors have to look at these big, bulky cameras while they’re acting? Because it’s very disconcerting.

GUIL: It is, isn’t it?

ROS: It’s so removed from reality.

GUIL,  _ seizing upon that _ : Reality. Is a film reality? Well, no—the logical argument is against it; it’s obviously a work of fiction with staged pieces and bits. However, if a film both reflects on reality and exists in reality, then must itself not be reality? Works of fiction are not created in a vacuum, after all. On the other hand, does the preserved nature of film set it apart from reality? Everything else in nature withers and decays according to the inexorable march of time, but a film can be viewed over and over again. Though I do concede that films eventually decay as well; reels in movie theatres only last so long.

ROS: I do like theatres.

GUIL: For film or performance?

ROS: Well that’s making me choose.

_ A pause, and then they’re suddenly in a new locale: a park in a city but there are no people or cars. _

ROS: That seemed a bit unnatural.

GUIL: We as members of the human race claim our own actions as unnatural. Do we not exist in the same way any creature does, therefore making us—and all of our actions—part of nature? Discuss.

ROS: I think that’s a dangerous conversation.

GUIL: Why?

ROS: You could upset people.

GUIL: Can’t any conversation upset people?

ROS: I'd like to think the best of us. What if I were to talk about, say, bubbles? Could you name any one person who would be upset over that?

GUIL:  _ (pause) _ Is that rhetoric?

_ Silence, as  _ ROS  _ has been distracted by bubbles coming out of nowhere _ .

GUIL: There’s not even anyone else in this scene. That’s a point against art reflecting nature.

ROS,  _ gesturing in the direction of the camera _ : But the way that people watching this now can see the vibrancy of the colours is a point for it.

GUIL: You sound like an advert. The fact that there's no scents is a point against.

ROS: The sound of the breeze is a point for.

GUIL:  _ (pause) _ There is a breeze… Do you hear a band?

_They look at each other in concern, and_ GUIL _grabs hold of_ ROS _’s_ _arm_.

_ The scene suddenly changes to an apartment with too many people in it. _ ROS  _ and _ GUIL  _ are by themselves at a window. _ GUIL  _ quickly releases _ ROS.

GUIL: Well now there’s too many people.

ROS: This is a lovely flat.

GUIL: You do know it’s a set, right?

ROS,  _ taking out a coin _ : Set, match.

GUIL,  _ slapping it out the window _ : No!

ROS  _ watches it forlornly. Suddenly, his mood changes _ .

ROS: You do know the principles of physics don’t work correctly in films, right?

GUIL: What do you mean, like Kepler’s First Law? The path of the planets is no longer an ellipse and the sun is no longer located at one of its foci?

ROS,  _ wistfully _ : Oh, I miss Kepler.  _ (shaking himself) _ But no, I mean, you could leap out this window, fall all the way down there, and land perfectly painlessly.

GUIL: Me?

ROS: No, I meant you in the general sense. The understood you? Or no, the universal you? Something like that.

GUIL: You’ve lost me. You mean the law of gravity no longer functions by its own governances?

ROS: I believe so.

GUIL: You believe it does or it does not?

ROS: It does not.

GUIL: Oh.  _ (pause. He looks away and the camera follows his line of vision. When he looks back,  _ ROS _ is gone) _ Guil--Rosencrantz?!

ROS,  _ from street level _ : Down here! See? I told you! I was right for once!

GUIL,  _ panicked about being separated _ : Should I join you?

ROS: Sure! Go ahead!

_ As _ GUIL  _ jumps out the window, the scene suddenly changes. He lands in a seat in a movie theatre next to _ ROS.  _ We cannot see the screen, but the dialogue is slightly echoed, as if the film on the screen is happening at almost the same time as this moment in ‘real life’. _

GUIL,  _ looking at the screen bemused but not too terribly concerned _ : Huh.

ROS:  _ (pause)  _ Where does light go when we close our eyes?

GUIL: I expect it just bounces off our eyelids and around the room until it’s so dissipated that it’s basically nothing.

ROS,  _ eyes closed _ : But we can still see  _ some  _ light when we close our eyes. It’s just the details that have gone fuzzy, those little pinpricks of colour.

GUIL,  _ studying _ ROS  _ closely, gently _ : Like when you know a person is on the other side of fogged glass but you can’t see them at all.

ROS,  _ eyes still closed _ : Or when you know someone is looking at you but you don’t know why.

ROS  _ opens his eyes. He and _ GUIL  _ are very close _ .

ROS,  _ very softly _ : Where do stories go when the scene ends?

GUIL,  _ equally as soft _ : I expect we’ll soon find out.

_ The scene starts to fade out to black. The two of them remain very close and do not move apart. A bit of movement is seen right as the scene goes completely black. _

_ Fin. _


End file.
